Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) narrates this statement of the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): "There is no reality to contagion." He also stated that the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "A sick person should not come to a healthy person."

Abu Salamah says: Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) used to narrate both these traditions to us from the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). After that, Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) stopped narrating that there is no reality to the contagiousness of disease, but he continued to narrate that a sick person should not be brought to a healthy person. A person named Harith, who was a cousin of Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him), said: O Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him)! Previously, I used to hear you narrate another hadith along with this one, but now you do not narrate what you used to narrate before. The Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "There is no reality to the contagiousness of disease." So Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) refused to acknowledge this and only said: that a sick person should not be brought to a healthy person. The narrator named Abu Salamah says: By my life, Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) used to narrate this hadith to us that the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "There is no reality to the contagiousness of disease." Now I do not know whether Sayyiduna Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) forgot this or whether one statement abrogated the other.

(Imam Ibn Hibban, may Allah have mercy on him, says:) There is no contradiction between these two narrations, nor does one abrogate the other. However, the statement of the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): "There is no reality to the contagiousness of disease" is a Sunnah that will be generally acted upon. The statement of the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): "A sick person should not be brought to a healthy person," by this, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) meant that one should not hold the belief that, by acting upon the contagiousness of disease, you knowingly harm your brother, even though the contagiousness of disease does not cause harm.